Just when I thought is was all getting a bit samey, I managed to shoot for new rounds for the first time in the space of a fortnight, ranging from an 18m indoor round to an 80yd outdoor round.
The first new round was a FITA 18, which we shot at our club's temporary indoor venue. Whilst 18m is the shortest distance I have shot indoors, it comes with the additional challenge of having a 40cm face , rather than the 60m face used on Portsmouth rounds at 20yds. Being a new distance for me, I had no sight marks, but just made an estimate from previous 20yd figures. At 10 dozen, the round is the same length as a Portsmouth, but expected scores for a specific handicap are much lower for a FITA 18 than for a Portsmouth. I am still trying to work on my technique and concentrating on using my back muscles and sometimes this goes horribly wrong, but I was pleased with my score of 402, giving a handicap figure of 52 - my best yet and much lower than my current indoor running handicap.
The following week was another indoor FITA, this time a FITA 25. As the name suggests, this is shot from 25m but, unlike the FITA 18, at a 60cm face. The expected scores for a specific handicap are much lower than for a Portsmouth, but slightly higher than a FITA 18. (I don't envy those folk who have to calculate these handicap figures!). My score this time was 382 (55 h/cap) so not as good as the FITA 18, but still my third Class E score.
The following weekend we were back outdoors. The weather was overcast, but totally windless, so I made the brave decision to have my first attempt a Long National at 80yds. If you have read my previous post on my adventures at 70m, you will know that it was not altogether successful! However, I did remember that I had adjusted my sight for the shorter indoor distances, so I moved it back to allow for the longer distance. The first two or three sighters fell well short, even when my sight was set so low that the sight pin risked fouling the arrow on release, so I decided to aim higher than the gold and managed to get some arrows on the boss. I eventually found that aiming at the fabric of the flag above the boss gave me a fairly consistent hit rate, but I found myself still aiming at the gold from time to time.
After the four dozen at 80yds, the two dozen at 60yds seemed relatively easy and I ended up with a score bang on my running handicap, which pleased me no end. What does puzzle me is that on subsequent rounds starting at 60yds, it seemed an awful lot harder than coming down from 80yds to 60yds. I guess it is that old chestnut of archery being all in the mind!
